I feel that I have the desire, a very strong desire, to do something great. And I don’t even know what but SOMETHING and it has to be great. But I lack the drive. Is that even possible? To have the desire but not actually do anything? Maybe that’s a contradiction. If I have a desire, and my desire was as strong as I say (or think), I would actually be making things happen. I’d be DOING something.

So, what’s holding me back? I guess that’s really the question. The right one anyway. Laziness? Fear of failure? Fear of hardwork? Which I suppose is the same as laziness.

I think what I really miss is the opportunity to not have anything to think about. I think being in college was when I did my best thinking, my best growing…

I think I attribute that to having so much free time. Free time to slack off and not use my brain for anything but selfish thoughts. These thoughts were mostly about my life. I thought a lot about who I was, how I got where I was and who/where I wanted to be and how to get there.

It’s possible that there’s a time and place for that kind of thinking and college is where it should all be done. But (and I don’t think this is any secret for anyone who knows me) I like to challenge expectations. What if I did this kind of thinking now? When I’m 26 years aged? What would happen then? How would I get to do that? Obviously I need to make money, I spend about 8-9 hours a day using my brain to… no, I spend 8-9 hours a day loaning my brain out to my employers, during this time my brain is working for them and not for me.

Is there a job where I can just let my brain do thinking exclusively for myself? Some would say “Yeah, Mitz. That’s what happens when you leave work at the end of the day.” I need more time than just 16 hours though, and allow me to point out that 6-7 of those hours I am actually unconscious, so those don’t even count. Anyway, I don’t even know why I’m talking about these hours on a daily basis. I should be thinking weekly.

In college I was “working” for a total of about 15 hours a week. That’s 15/120 hours! Note: I’m only talking weekdays here. That means I had roughly 85 hours a week (I didn’t sleep much in college. Which is normal, right?) to think about my life. Seeing as how I work 40 hours a week right now (sometimes it feels like 50), I’d say that’s a lot of time to be using my brain for thinking about things.

And now, now what? I don’t even have the time to  calculate how much time I have to think about my life. No wonder I feel lost, hopeless, without any drive or focus. I can’t even get a decent Deep Thought™ in that amount of time. I think it takes at least 4 hours of undisturbed non-think to get to the Deep Thought™ head space. The only way for me to get there now is to stay up way late (much like I am tonight). Or to start while I’m at work and that’s not going to happen. What I need now is to find a way to still make money to stay live, but still be able to let my brain work for me as much as possible.

Well, there’s another project to work on. I can’t think about this anymore, I need to go to sleep. (Damn you, schedule of a responsible adult!)

I’d like to take a photography class and learn how to develop my own film.

I’d like to make a demo reel. Just a demo reel of stuff I’ve filmed (which is so far nothing). I went to an Academy of Art student show and watched the cinematography students’ demo reels. I want to make one.

… and I am a social girl.

So I’m watching Kiss Kiss Bang Bang and it’s possibly the first good movie I’ve seen in a long time. I’m really enjoying it, you know? And the first thing I think is something like “Man, I need to tell someone I’m watching this great movie!” Not word for word but like I said, something like that. Anyway, I feel this immediate need to share this with someone. Voila, the effects of too much social media and social networking.

It makes me wonder what I used to do when I watched a good movie, or read a great book. Did I feel the need to find someone to talk to about it? Did I feel the need to share?

So since I saw Star Trek on Thursday night (unofficial opening) I’ve been watching episodes of season 1 on YouTube.

Which is nerdy sure, but also lots of fun watching Sulu run around the U.S.S. Enterprise shirtless and wielding sword.

I’m spending the weekend down South (meaning the Southern outskirts of Los Angeles county) with family. Tracy and I made a cake for grandma’s birthday.

It’s strawberry lemonade cake with lemon cream cheese frosting and garnished with slices of strawberries. It was probably the closest thing to having a fruity cake as I would allow.

For some reason my family loves the horrible tasting “fruit cakes” meaning they have a layer (or two) of fruit in the center and topped with fruit and that fake horrible tasting frosting, if you can call it that.

Rummaging around the internet today these are the things I found:

An artist named Eva Funderburgh who makes the cutest little creatures that I wish were alive

I want to buy one: link

Also, Audrey Kawasaki is having another print go on sale this weekend. I want in on that. Tracy will be in town and it’s mother’s day but hopefully we can stall dim sum for 10 minutes after 12 noon:  link

May is so busy for me! I pretty much have things scheduled for every weekend.

This past weekend was Orange County brunch, a monthly brunch event in Seal Beach. Then there was Unique Los Angeles after that. On Sunday I had an impromptu trip to Disneyland for Bats Day. That was… interesting.

Each time I go to Disneyland I find less and less to do there. I think I’ve succumb to the jaded passholder mindset, which is that there are really only four fun rides and once you do that there isn’t much else to do. Which is somewhat true. If it’s your first time though, you have to do everything. I’ll still never understand how people can take a three or four day vacation at the Disneyland resort. There’s not enough things to do in that park to fill four days.

The new Toy Story ride is probably the most fun game ride there is at the whole resort (though I can only think of one other game ride – Buzz Lightyear’s Astro Blasters). It’s in 3-D, hence the glasses above, and much easier to aim than Buzz Lightyear.

So back to my May. This weekend Tracy is flying in, as well as Aunt Karen. I assume we’re all going out for Mother’s Day dim sum and who knows what other hi-jinks.

The following weekend I have an old friend coming to visit for the first time. I want to take him everywhere! I’ve even taken a day off work.

Memorial Day weekend I will be in San Francisco for SG Prom. Fourth year in a row or something? Staying at Good Hotel again. I’m very excited about that.

Then the final weekend of May I’m planning on taking a sewing lesson at Common Thread Studio that just opened up downstairs. It’s a store and sewing studio. Finally I will learn the right way to sew things. I should probably reserve my spot now.

Went to Unique L.A. with Jamie for a few hours today. Spent mucho bucks, “met” Rob McElhenney and Kaitlin Olson from It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, got myself a new uterus, some tree art, some pins and a new belt buckle:

I also got some great inspirations and great ideas from vendors.

Visit:

hi tree

i heart guts

Ashton Photography + Design

This weekend was rad and I am pooped.

recap complete with random pictures taken over the weekend.

Friday
I left work and headed to LAX, thought I was going to miss the plane but made it there with some time to spare. Jamie, and I, flew into SFO, checked into our hotel and then headed directly to Sparky’s for a late night dinner with JP.

ReadyMade vending machine from our hotel’s lobby.

Saturday
The lady and I made our way to The Embarcadero as we had a date with my aunt, uncle and cousin in San Anselmo. Bought tickets for a Sausalito Ferry ride and wandered around the farmers market at the ferry building for awhile.

The ferry ride was pretty fun, had Lonely Island’s I’m On A Boat stuck in my head pretty much the whole time.

We spent the day in Marin county, around the Sausalito and San Anselmo areas. I can’t recall actually doing anything notable. Acquired cupcakes from Comforts, then burritos, then vintage/thrift shopping.

Later that night we went to a cardboard costume housewarming party, where I sampled some Skittles vodka and made an on the spot costume:

Went back to the hotel and crashed early.

Sunday
Had brunch with various members of SGSF, after which we all wandered Valencia in the unusually hot sun:

I managed to drag Jamie and JP to Dolores Park to sit and people watch in the shade of some trees.

Later we wandered over to the Metreon where we met up with Ashima. All us four-eyed kids had a contest to see who has the worst vision. JP and I pretty much have equally bad vision.

Watched I Love You, Man then found our way back over to the mission for some more late night eats at Herbivore. After dinner Jamie and I split up with the kids and retired to our hotel room to repack and die of full bellies.

Had a lot of fun, walked a lot, didn’t get a second to myself. It was nice.

Remember how I was saying in an earlier post that I was the the orthopedic specialists’ office?

Well, it was because this happened

I was sledding with Erik, Kelsey, Jamie, Nathan and Brianna in Mammoth over Valentine’s Day weekend and I ended up sledding straight into a rather large, solid tree.

From the looks of the photo that Kelsey took, my leg twisted upon impact.

My x rays showed no signs of bone damage, so I had to get an MRI done. From the MRI they saw that I had partially torn my ACL and MCL and bruised my bone a little bit.

So now I’m on my second week of physical therapy and I’ve gotta say that its already a million times better. I was pretty ecstatic yesterday because I wore pants for the first time in a month. I can finally walk without a brace anymore and at a somewhat normal speed.

Full recovery, huzzah!

So I was at the orthopaedic specialist’s office on Friday (this is another story entirely, that I’ll probably tell you later!) and began reading an article in Audubon magazine (which I had never even heard of before) that made me re-evaluate my recent eating habits.

The Low Carbon Diet : Audubon Magazine

In the past few months I’ve been rationalizing my consumption of meat, mostly just chicken and seafood.  I’ve been telling myself that free-range, organically raised chicken is okay. Beef is not. I can eat seafood if it’s on the Monterey Bay Safe Seafood list – still not sure where I stand on this issue actually. And other such excuses, but after reading the article, it confirmed my tinge of meat lovers guilt. I knew that making these little meat “allowances” meant I still wasn’t doing everything I could do to help the situation and the impact that raising meat is having on the climate crisis.

Honestly, I love meat, but I’ve chosen to refrain from eating it mainly due to the environmental cost of raising it. Originally I had decided to stop consuming meat after reading The Way We Eat: Why Our Food Choices Matter.  Before that I hadn’t realized how much of our resources we were pumping into meat production. Furthermore, the indirect costs of factory farming (excessive amounts of animal waste, CO2 production – as well as other heat trapping gasses) were just as detrimental to the environment.

As a ethical issue, the consumption of meat actually does not bother me. Humans are omnivores and were made to be able to consume meat, it’s a natural way of life. On the other hand, I do have a problem with the concept of “meat farms”. I don’t approve of chickens, cows, pigs, etc being cooped up in their tiny cages with poor living conditions and being grown like crops. It’s just not fair, sure we eat them but that shouldn’t be the entire life they are allowed to live.

I don’t know how I developed this “condition” but when I walk by the butcher case sometimes I replace the hams and beef cuts with human parts and I have to get far, far away from that part of the supermarket. Maybe I’ve watched one too many horror movies, maybe my subconscious is trying to make me stay away from it. Anyway, this then makes me think back to the factory farms and if I start replacing those animals, living like slaves, with humans then I feel a little sick about that too.

It’s been hard for me to not have a bite of something with seafood or chicken when I have dinner with my family or go to Dim Sum with them on the weekends. My family almost always eats Chinese food, and most Chinese food is heavy on the meat and it’s also delicious. It’s food I grew up with so it’s hard to not want to eat at least some of it and participate in the family meal. It’s also difficult when my family doesn’t quite understand the reasons behind my decisions. It’s kind of like in My Big Fat Greek Wedding, the mother of the bride says she’ll make lamb when the bride tells her that the groom doesn’t eat meat. They ask me what happens when I go out to dinner with friends, “What do you do? Are you eating? Do you just sit there?” as if restaurants don’t have vegetarian options.

Anyway, I realized that I’ve just been putting off doing what I know I should do and really stop eating meat once and for all. I want to do my part and also set an example as a meat lover who has stopped eating meat. Sometimes we have to make those sacrifices and this is one I am willing to make.

The Low Carbon Diet is the article and it’s available online if you want to read it.